“What stretches to do to strengthen ankles?”

Proprioception exercises are the best method to strengthen an ankle. Standing on one foot with you eyes closed and working on strengthening the supporting structures of the ankle to maintain balance.

Stretching and strengthening is not the same thing. Stretching does not strengthen ankles. You can do what is called "heel rises" aka "heel lifts" to strengthen your ankles. Here is an example for you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kw01UnxsmS0. When doing this on two feet becomes too easy and you are not feeling discomfort after doing 30 of them, you can start doing them on one foot. Just make sure you stand in front of a counter or a table so that you can use it for balance if necessary.

Hello,

Stretching can help the ankle become more pliable and flexible. It will bring new blood to the muscles around the ankle. The best way to strengthen, though, is through resistive exercises and joint-health activities. See this link:

https://www.pop-doc.com/browse.cgi?category1=Ankle

First month is free. Try it out.

David T. Neuman, MD

Stretching exercise do not strengthen the muscles of the ankle. To stabilize the ankle you need to strengthen the eversion, i.e., rotating the foot to the outside, and inversion, i.e., rotating the foot to the inside. You can strengthen the eversion and inversion of the ankle with a rubber band looping around both your ankle with some tension when you try to rotate your ankle outside. Swimming is also a good exercise to strengthen your ankle.